Student Feedback*
*This is not a comprehensive list of all of the feedback that I have received from students. All student feedback for USF courses is open-access and can be found at this link. You can search by instructor or course (PCB 3043L or BSC 2011L), but keep in mind, I would only have taught one or two lab sections a semester despite being labeled as an instructor.
The specific sections I have taught for Ecology are: 005 & 006 (Fall 2017), 003 & 005 (Spring 2018), 002 (Fall 2019), 003 (Spring 2020), 002 & 006 (Fall 2020), 010 (Spring 2021), and 002 (Fall 201). The specific sections I have taught for Biology are: 016 (Summer 2021) and 907 (Spring 2023).
Fall 2017 (In-person)
"Amazing!!! Best TA I've ever had and I am so thankful she came to USF! She provided great, detailed feedback in order to ensure learning of material and successful assignments. Always willing to help and of course a great sense of humor too!"
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"Jessica was fun, engaging, and an excellent TA. She always provided extra resources and time if we needed it. Shes's very personable and easy to communicate with. I am glad she was my TA for this lab."
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"Great TA was always helpful when asked a question and makes class fun. Actually explains what we are doing in lab and makes sure we understand the concepts. Gives amazing feedback on assignments so we can improve on our skills."
Spring 2018 (In-person)
"Jessica effectively instructed the lab with plenty of real life examples and exciting studies were discussed. The material was broken down to better understand each component until the class was able to build ecological explanations for species interactions utilizing all concepts the lab studied.
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"Jessica Balerna is the greatest TA ever. She really explains everything well and understands [the] concepts well enough to relay the information in an easy manner. She is very kind and generous and is fun so it makes you want to listen to her."
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"Jessica is really good at explaining and teaching concepts and examples of ecology. I think I have learned more applicable concepts of ecology in lab than I have in lecture."
Fall 2019 (In-person)
"She was great! Really enjoyed her class. Very helpful for before tests and on every assignment. Always left her class learning something and stuck with me until the test."
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"Best TA I have had thus far, all grading was fair."
Spring 2020 (Mid-semester transition to online due to Covid-19 pandemic)
"Jessica always made lab super fun and interesting. Every day she walked in with a smile and enthusiasm about the subject getting everyone ready to do whatever we needed to do for that day. Jessica was always willing to answer any questions and ready to help you understand the material better. When the class was transferred to online Jessica did discussion boards so we can ask questions during class time. She also adjusted quiz time after getting feedback about the time limit being to short. Jessica made the transition to online much easier."
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"Professor Balerna is passionate about ecology and extremely considerate of the needs of students. She was willing and able to address all of my concerns and confusion in the lab and by email. She was humorous and engaging during lectures, and provided thorough and personalized feedback on all presentations and lab reports."
Fall 2020 (Fully online due to Covid-19 pandemic)
"Jessica has been a pleasure to have as my Ecology Lab TA. She encourages student engagement in class, and clearly explains the expectations for each assignment. She is always happy to discuss any questions or concerns outside of lab hours as well."
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"[She was] an amazing lab instructor! [She] made the class so interesting and fun even though it was all online. I know it was hard teaching virtually but [she] made it look so easy."
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"She is great!! Always helpful, responds super fast and is readily available... she is [an] awesome LAB teacher"
Spring 2021 (Fully online due to Covid-19 pandemic)
"I absolutely loved Jessica! She made lab enjoyable and that was definitely needed given the length of the lab. I am not an excel person at all but she was always willing to help and clearly enjoyed the topics. She was super approachable and understanding, as I think all TAs should be."
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"Ecology lab was exciting and very useful. It helped build my skills with Excel and gave me the opportunity to work with scientific data. This also gave me practice with using data to prove hypotheses like a real scientist."
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"[Jessica] was an amazing TA (definitely one of the best, if not /the/ best, that I've had!). She was excellent at conducting her lectures and making sure everyone understood how to complete each activity, and her interest in the material being covered made me more interested in the material being covered, too."
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"Jessica is by far the best Teaching Assistant I have had thus far in my time at USF. She looks out for her students, ensures that all of them are involved in discussion, and makes sure no student is left behind in reviewing ecology material. Thank you for all that you do!"
Fall 2021 (In-person)
"By far the best TA I have ever had. Super engaging, super understanding and most importantly she made ecology fun."
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"Great teacher; very considerate and willing to answer questions."
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"[Jessica] did amazing when explaining information."
Summer 2021 (Online)
"I absolutely loved having Jessica Balerna as my TA. She was so kind and respectful in all interactions and made the live sessions enjoyable to attend. If I ever had a question, she made it known that she was available either during class time or over email. And when I did email her, she was always super helpful and nice. I think she's a great TA and I would definitely take her again if I had the chance."
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"[Jessica] was very kind and a fun teacher that made labs enjoyable."
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"Amazing T.A. [Jessica] was passionate about what we learned in this class and was very nice and helpful."
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"Jessica was very interesting to listen to in class. She had a way of making the class interesting and kept students engaged with just a slide show. She was very caring and open to any questions students had."
Spring 2023 (In-person)
"For an 8am lab she was very enthusiastic and engaging with each person in the lab. She was able to communicate and connect with each student while maintainingprofessionalism every week. She was well informed on everything being done in the lab and worked efficiently to ensure each lab group completed the lab without questions or hesitations."
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"Jessica was so fun and lively, which scared me because it was a lab at 8 am. The labs were constantly engaging, and her love for science really helped make the lab a pleasant place to be. She really set my standards high for future lab instructors."
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"Despite my lab being at 8 am I enjoyed every moment of it."
Fig. 1: Average student ratings for each semester that I have taught the lab portion of Principles of Ecology (PCB 3043L) or Biological Diversity (BSC 2011L) at University of South Florida's Tampa Campus (Tampa, FL). Note the scale. As you look at this figure, I'm sure you'll notice that I received low scores in two semesters. These semesters were my first two semesters of graduate school (Fall 2017 and Spring 2018) teaching upper-level students, some of whom were actually older than me, the instructor. Reflecting on those semesters, I think that I tried very hard to be "just another student," and not hard enough to be the instructor. This likely stemmed from both a lack of confidence and experience. After taking ATLE's prep course at USF and changing the materials to more closely align with my teaching philosophy, I felt more comfortable leading the course. I think this newfound confidence, in addition to my renewed interest in the course material, both helped boost my ratings in the subsequent semesters (Fall 2019 through present).
Fig. 2: Average student ratings for each semester that I have taught the lab portion of Principles of Ecology (PCB 3043L) and Biological Diversity Lab (BSC 2011L) with comparisons to the average ratings across all instructors in the Integrative Biology Department and College of Arts & Sciences at University of South Florida's Tampa Campus (Tampa, FL). Note the scale.
Fig. 3: Average overall instructor rating as well as average student GPA for each semester that I have taught the lab portion of Principles of Ecology (PCB 3043L) and Biological Diversity (BSC 2011L).
In Fall 2017, 18 out of 44 students (41%) responded to the assessments; in Spring 2018, 20 out of 46 students (43%) responded to the assessments; in Fall 2019, 6 out of 23 students (26%) responded to the assessments; in Spring 2020, 8 out of the 22 students (36%) responded to the assessments; in Fall 2020, 11 out of 46 (24%) responded to the assessments; in Spring 2021, 11 out of 28 students (39%) responded to the assessments; in Summer 2021, 9 out of 27 students (33%) responded to the assessments; in Fall 2021, 6 out of 23 students (26%) responded to the assessments; finally, in Spring 2023, 3 out of 22 students (14%) responded to the assessments.
Want to browse some of the materials I created for the Principles of Ecology lab course?